Veterinary nurse Lisa Thring attending to Gelert at the Parap Veterinary Hospital. She has been nominated for Community Spirit or Care and Compassion medal in the Newscorp Pride of Australia Medals. Picture: AARON BURTONSource: News Limited

THERE probably isn’t a type of animal on the planet vet nurse Lisa Thring hasn’t nursed back to health.

Cats, dogs, birds, lizards — they’re all covered.

She said the weirdest thing she had nursed was an ostrich.

“He had a cut on his neck that we had to stitch up,” she said.

He was a bit cranky, and they had to put the massive bird under a general anaesthetic to stitch the wound.

All in a day’s work for Lisa ThringSource: News Limited

Ms Thring has now been nominated for a Pride of Australia medal, in Community Spirit medal.

She said she’s “pretty surprised” to be nominated. “I wasn’t expecting it,” she said.

Ms Thring has been a vet nurse for six years, and is based at Parap Veterinary Clinic.

She is also doing extra study in her extra time — doing two diplomas simultaneously. She hopes to stay in Darwin long-term.

“There is a really good community around Parap — we get lots of people come through, and you get to know clients very well, and their pets obviously,” she said.

Lizards are her favourite.

“We get a few that come through — a lot of people around Darwin have bearded dragons and blue tongues.”

She said her favourite memory of her time as a vet nurse was nursing a badly burnt cat back to health.

“A cat was in a bushfire, and all four legs were burnt.

“We bandaged him up for a long time. We never found his owner, but one of our vets took him on, so that was a nice story.

“They were really bad burns, but he’s fine now.”

In the decade since their inception, the Pride of Australia awards have honoured more than 550 Australians, shared more than 19,000 inspirational stories and unearthed extraordinary feats of courage and heroism.